There was a time not so long ago when I actually clicked on the bulk mail folder and made a cursory (and I do mean cursory) inspection of its contents before hitting "Empty." Well, that time is officially over. For awhile, I was emptying it most of the time without looking in it, but I'd occasionally take a gander if the mood struck. Well, no longer. While there might well be stuff I want to see in there, I'm just not going to look anymore. On a typical day when I check my email for the first time, there are about 40 messages in the bulk folder, which I promptly empty. Throughout the day I'd estimate that another 50 appear, all of which are emptied from the folder upon my noticing them. If only, say, 25 messages a day were in that folder, I'd probably be inclined to look at it before emptying it. But with a minimum approaching 100 messages a day in there, even a government employee with oodles of spare time has to draw the line and say "no more!" Then there's the annoyance of the spam that sneaks by the filter. Sure, it's just a minor annoyance and is checked off and dispatched to spam hell with a quickness, if you will, but such is my contempt for spam that it annoys me just to see it sitting there in my inbox intermingled with stuff I actually want to read. More annoying still is that dude profiled in the wsj earlier this week that actually relishes spam and purchases the goods (and I use the term loosely) hawked therein. For every one of him there are a million unlike him who don't wish to run out of mailbox space because of those like him. That he is unashamed enough to allow himself to be interviewed and named in an internationally circulated publication is appalling in itself. A Darwin award candidate if ever there was one. But if he keeps buying his nutritional supplements from spammers, perhaps we won't have him to blame for the constant deluge of unsolicited email for much longer. Dude, if you need vitamins, go to Wal-Mart. Or buy them from that fellow on the corner with the fancy shoes. He says he's "got da good shit." Believe him. It shouldn't be a stretch, since you're buying stuff pitched to you in spam, you're obviously a trusting sort of a fellow. And a drooling moron.
But enough of that. And enough of this. Sorry to disappoint those that read all of this drivel waiting to see what the point of all of it was. Sometimes there isn't a point.
2:21 PM
"The hijab (veil) is a protection against upper respiratory tract infection," the Saudi Gazette quoted Malaker as saying. "In the kingdom, nasopharyngeal throat cancer ailment is very low among women as compared to men."
Is it possible that the fact that women don't have the freedom of movement that men do might also explain their exposure to fewer pathogens? Women aren't allowed to drive in the Kingdom and they certainly can't go frolicking all over the place as men do. Be it through veil or restricted movement, oppression helps women, the good doctor would have us believe. And lets take it a step further. These women aren't showing a lot of skin, either to other people, or to the sun. So we can be almost certain that their incidence of skin cancer is lower. Another health benefit to be gained by forcing the hijab. I'm not even a professional public health "official" and I thought of that. A real public health lunatic could undoubtedly come up with all kinds of other benefits to be gained. Some clever bureaucrat might even go so far as to say that women who don't wear the hijab and remain close to their homes are actually costing society money. Hmm. Let's just think about the implications if this was widely accepted in the public health community.
How this is in any way something the EPA should be involved in remains unclear, as does the legality of the whole thing, despite the claim that there is somehow a connection and that this is all a good idea. In reading from this lengthy document, which probably cost the GDP of a respectable nation in confiscated tax dollars to produce, I see that the wise promoters of "Smart Growth" (see, it can't possibly be dumb!) freely admit that most of the problems that they plan to address through government meddling were in fact caused by.....government meddling. But they're going to do better this time, because this time it is SMART. If any private company dared to lie so hideously about the nature of a product or service, it would immediately be dismantled and its CEO sent to prison. For example, if I took a bunch of contaminated sand from a Superfund site, mixed it with dog urine, packaged it as 24K gold, threw a bunch of official certifications of authenticity, etc. on the labels then sold it for what gold sells for, I'd find myself in legal trouble when it was discovered that I'd been selling dessicated dog urine. But if a consortium of idiotic bureaucrats takes a bunch of stupidity and packages it as "smart," that's a different story.
1:34 PM
Wednesday, March 17, 2004 Olive Trees
Olive trees, they say? A crock of steaming terrier excrement might be a more apt description:
To honour Rachel Corrie, the US activist crushed to death by a D9 Caterpillar-made Israeli military bulldozer a year ago today, protesters intend to occupy Caterpillar Defence Industries in Shrewsbury, leaflet and dialogue with workers on the impact of their work, and grind production lines to a halt for a 3 minute silence in honour of Rachel’s life and the 2,859 Palestinians killed by the Israeli occupation since the 28th of September 2000.
Most of the Protestors have lived in Occupied Palestine with Palestinian families, and witnessed first hand the destruction of homes, olive trees, and lives by Caterpillar bulldozers. Some have felt the violence of the Israeli Occupation on their own bodies and seen friends, including children, shot to death by the Israeli army. Caterpillar is complicit with and aids these war crimes by supplying military equipment to the Israeli army.
Since 1967 Israel has used Caterpillar bulldozers to demolish nearly 9,000 Palestinian homes, leaving more than 50,000 people homeless. Since September 2000, Israel has razed 12,737 homes in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In the past two years Caterpillar D9s demolished an entire neighbourhood in Jenin refugee camp and uprooted 200,000 Palestinian olive trees.
23-year-old American Peace Activist Rachel Corrie, was killed by a Caterpillar D9 bulldozer on March 16, 2003 as she nonviolently tried to prevent it from destroying a Palestinian home in the Gaza Strip.
Caterpillar profits from Israel's construction of the 25 foot high Security Barrier (aka The Apartheid Wall) that will confiscate approximately 40 percent of the West Bank under the guise of enhancing Israeli security. The wall separates Palestinians from their farmlands and cuts some villages off from the rest of the West Bank, rendering as many as 100,000 people completely isolated.
Protestors will remain in occupation until they have met the Director or Caterpillar Defence Industries where they will call on Caterpillar to respect human rights and international Human Rights law by terminating its supply contract with the Israeli Government.
Until reading this, I will admit I had no desire to own any large equipment made by Caterpillar, as I believe such products have limited uses around the home. But now that I know that they are opposed by fans of "Occupied Palestine" I'm kinda getting a hankering for a nice bulldozer, or maybe a really big tractor or something. Hopefully, Caterpillar will learn something from the protestors and will design and market a "Terrorist Bitch Crusher" emblazoned with a likeness of Rachel Corrie being urinated on by a caterpillar. We'll see.
Also, scrolling down the page, I noticed some shreds of decency posted by some guys named Brett and Jon. It's nice to see shreds of decency interspersed with all the raving insanity.
2:23 PM
Has anyone noticed?
It would appear that bigdave3d has made a radical departure from its predecessor and has wholeheartedly adopted the format of linking to an article, then making a few smart-ass comments about it. I say "Bravo!" You can never read too many stupidity-containing articles, and its certainly quite impossible to get enough snide commentary. In other words, two thumbs up.
1:13 PM
Tuesday, March 16, 2004
Happy Dead Terrorist-Helper Day!
Rachel Corrie died for her "country" (Palestine) one year ago today.
On my way to do a Google search to see what would pair best with the Champagne I'll be toasting Ms. Corrie's death with later, I came across the following:
The main theme of this article seems to be imaginary. Or imagined. Or the product of imagination, if you will. Sure, the title and some of the wording suggest it's some sort of tribute to the venerable Rachel Corrie, but it's all imaginary, the product of a depraved mind. Just like, as luck would have it, Rachel Corrie's heroism.
2:50 PM
